


Goodbyes on a Southwest Wind

by escapedreality



Category: The Book Thief - Markus Zusak
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-31
Updated: 2015-07-31
Packaged: 2018-04-12 05:07:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 834
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4466528
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/escapedreality/pseuds/escapedreality
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Featuring a girl, a boy, and a thousand memories. Liesel learns to say goodbye.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Goodbye

People pointed, and whispered and no doubt found it odd when Liesel waded into the Amper that day. Whispering something about a  _Saumensch_  and something about a kiss. Yes, people thought that Himmel Street was finally taking it's toll on little Liesel Meminger. They didn't know how deeply it already had.

If she could count the amount of times she had tried to say goodbye to the boy with lemon hair. To Jesse Owens. To the pale face with ashy lips. Her fellow book thief.

*****A point of interest***  
For Liesel Meminger, that list could continue on forever.**

Her first attempt at farewell was in the dusty remains of heaven (or Himmel, but really it's one in the same). On the stretch of street where ghosts of children and a soccer ball played.

She stood between the goalposts, felt a faceful of mud.

She couldn't say goodbye here. She walked dejectedly back to Frau Hermann's.

It's a week before she can drag herself down to Hubert Oval. In the shadows she's sees the boy with lemon hair and charcoal covered skin flying in the darkness. She remembers the glint of medals that perhaps ended his life. She remembers the mud and racing and a bet,

"One day Liesel, you'll be dying to kiss me."

She swallows heavily, thinking about how wrong he was.

How he died for her to kiss him.

She's walking to Frau Hermann's door and the memory of the weight of laundry is weighing her down. The memory of the cheery boy who joined her on her rounds makes it that much heavier.

*****Something I've come to realize***  
Goodbyes are far harder than they should be.**

Alex Steiner visits her two weeks later, bringing the Mayor and his wife a half dozen apples as a present. When Frau Hermann offers her one, all she can do is shake her head over and over again.

The little reminders are the worst. They play in her head over and over, nagging and asking why she hasn't said goodbye yet.

She'd tried, she really has.

Because she's sat in the library with it's window open and she's stared out of it, the word on the tip of her tongue. Because she's placed a teddy bear at the foot of a broken shell of a plane. Because she swears she's tried everything and Crucified Christ, this is a lot harder than necessary.

*****The Last Reason***  
It was the only thing she hadn't tried yet.**

The day was windy and her hair blows in her face but she ignores it, walking the familiar path toward the river. She stares, watching it a moment, seeing the bookfly through the sky and seeing a shivering boy standing in the water...

"How about a kiss, Sausmench?" she whispers, finding herself standing in the river fully clotherd. The watter ripples around her, moving persistently forward, despite her being in the way. The sky is streaked yellow, like the color of Rudy's hair. She speaks and the words no longer become stuck on her tongue or sound disembodied.

Rather, they float along with the river, along the wind,

_Goodbye Rudy, Goodbye._


	2. Hello

In collecting humans from their mortal encasement, there's only one color the sky never is.

Pure white.

No, the pure, angelic white is reserved for the delivery of souls only. It's white, no floor, no sky. No golden shining gates, just the white, the fog and the souls.

After showing the Book Thief her book, I brought her to this drop off point, her chatting amicably with me the entire way. It's always strange when a soul speaks to me. All day I carry them and it's one in a million that actually talks- and Liesel was certainly one of these.

I set her down on what I have always perceived to be the floor. She looked around, and for the first time, I saw trepidation cross over her face.

"But, there's nothing.."

Her voice is small and childish, like the first day she arrived in Molching and refused to get out of the car. She stands there, staring wide eyed in the fog around us, unmoving.

Now, I don't know exactly where souls go after drop off. They usually just wander off into the fog- or I push them that way if they don't move. But with the Book Thief it's different, I can't bring myself to nudge her along.

Then, very faintly, I hear it.

"Saumensch? Liesel? Liesel!"

A shadow breaks away, running full force at us. He's smiling and his hair is yellow. Liesel turns to the younger boy and when she does, years disappear and it's two children standing before each other again.

"Hello, Rudy," the Book Thief says, a grin firmly plastered to her face. He smiles back at her, eyes alight with decades of something I can only call love.

"How about a kiss, Saumensch?"

She obliges.

*** A new realization ***   
**Sometimes, death is beautiful.**

And that makes me feel much better about this job.


End file.
